Dark Shadows
by Nan-darkness
Summary: Helena Cain has her own way of dealing with the shadows of her past, lucky for her there is Gina. Please read WARNING before reading!


**Title: Dark Shadows  
Author: Nan  
Ship: Cain/Gina  
Rating: M  
Disclaimer: I do not owe any characters  
Warning: This is a hurt/comfort fic dealing with self harm. If you can't handle this or afraid it can trigger, please don't read it.**

Her vision is blurred, drops of sweat pearling on her forehead, making her bangs stick uncomfortable to her face. Goosebumps over her arms and legs, she shivers though she is not cold.  
This has become a ritual, an escape, the only way she can deals with the day to day life. It has been for a long time. She can hardly remember when it started…

She clipped open her knife, her weapon, her savior. The metal of the blade feels cool in her hand, almost comforting….. almost like home…. It's the only thing she has left that reminds her of the day her life ended. She slowly trails the top of the blade along the exposed skin of her upper leg.  
She closed her eyes and exhaled.

_I failed them, I have failed them all. Mother, father, Lucy, my fellow officers, my friends…._

Slowly but deliberate she pressed the blade into her skin, creating a long straight cut.  
She shivered under the tingling sensation as her blood flowed from her freshly parted flesh.  
As she repeats her action, she thinks of them. She sees their faces, she hears their voices.

_I could have saved them._

It was her job, her duty. In her mind she still hears her sisters voice, screaming her name.  
As her blood flows the sensation of relieve washes over her, and for the first time in weeks she is able to breathe again. It makes her feel like she is still connected to this world. Still part of the cycle of live, even though the walls around here are falling apart.

Suddenly she was pulled out of her thoughts as she heard someone at the door.

"Helena, are you in there?" Gina was worried.  
She tried to open the bathroom door, but it was locked.  
The Admiral was having one of her 'dark days' ,as the crew called them, again.  
What Gina worried was how often the Admiral seem to have them these days.  
On these days she didn't speak much and wasn't available for meetings to anyone, not even to Gina.  
Tonight, Gina thought to surprise her, see if she could offer small relief to some of her lovers stress and burdens of being Admiral of the human-race.

"Helena I know you're in there, please open the door. It's me Gina" still no answer.  
Perhaps it was best to leave her to have her privacy. If this was Helena's way of coping, Gina had to respect this.  
Yet Gina couldn't shake the feeling that something was up.  
It was fine for the Admiral to have her dark days, but this was getting too much.  
She changed her mind about leaving and instead forced the door open with superior strength.

The way she found her lover would continue to hunt her for days.  
She was collapsed on the bathroom floor, wearing nothing but her underwear.  
Red, bleeding streaks across her leg, and her knife, _that damned knife of hers,_ dirty and hanging loosely in her hand.

"By the Gods, what did you do?" Gina rushed forward and kneeled down beside the collapsed Admirals body.  
Cain turned her gaze away, unable to confront that hurt look Gina had in her eyes.

"I need to get a medic" she stated and got up to move to the phone.  
Midway Cain grabbed her arm.  
"N..no…" she slurred.  
Gina looked her in the eye and never saw this haunted look before.  
Like a wild animal, trapped in a small cage.

"O..kay…" she answered, thinking this was not the right moment to argue.  
"I'm just going to take the med kit from the office, I'll be right back"  
She rushed out of the bathroom to the office. Under the desk she found the med kid.  
She placed it on the desk and opened the kid. Grabbing some bandages and antiseptics she made her way back to the bathroom.  
It was all too clear to Gina that the Admiral was falling apart.  
The weight of humanities survival on her shoulders, became a burden she started to collapse under.  
Even for the powerful Admiral Cain it was becoming too much to handle.  
This idea scared Gina more then she was willing to admit.

When Gina made it back she found Helena where she had left her.  
She was still staring at the wall, though her face was now stained.  
_She must have been crying….  
_Gina touched the skin on Helena's leg. It was cold and damp with sweat, like someone who's having a bad fever.  
When she cared for her wounds Helena never made a sound.  
Gina noticed the scars on Helena's legs and stomach.  
When she had asked about them, she had been told they were old battle scars.  
By now, Gina wasn't so sure anymore.

The next thing was getting her off the cold bathroom floor.  
She seemed in no state to move.  
"Come on, I'll get you to bed" she said as she whipped the hair that stuck to Helena's face out of the way so she could look at her. She didn't seem here. She looked so lost, bewildered, alone..  
Gina couldn't believe that this collapsed pile of human being was the same charismatic Admiral Helena Cain she fell in love with two years ago.

Gina wrapped one of Cain's arms around her shoulder, and dragged the Admiral off the floor.  
She was surprised how light the older women weight.  
Then she tried to recall the last time she saw Helena eating a proper meal…. she couldn't.

Gina got Cain to her rack and supported her to lay down easy.  
Gina herself laid down beside her, one arm popped under her head so she could observe Helena.  
Cain just stared at the ceiling, her face blank.  
After a while, she spoke.

"Gina… I am sorry you had to witness that" she said in a very formal and detached tone.  
"I'll make sure It won't happen again" she add, still not making eye contact.

"What will not happen again, you hurting yourself, or me witnessing it?" … silence….

Gina rolled onto her stomach and tried to read Helena's face. There was nothing to be read on it. As if she mentally detached herself from her body.

"Helena look at me… how long has this been going on?" still no response.  
Gina sat up and grabbed Helena's face to force her to look at her.  
She saw something in her lovers eyes…. emotion?  
If so, the Admiral was fighting hard to constrain them.  
But Gina knew she would lose the battle.

"Come on! It's okay to let your emotions out. You're the Admiral but you are ALSO human!" Gina no longer tried to hide her emotions. "Now talk to me! How long?"

Cain didn't want this confrontation, yet she knew she could not deny Gina.  
"Five years, off and on…"she answered. This time she could not escape the look in Gina's eyes.  
The hurt that was written in them, the pain her words caused her.. it broke Cain's heart.  
Gina blinked her eyes, that particular ways she always does when she's upset but tries to get her feelings under control.  
Helena felt the grip around her face loosen, so she turned her head, no longer facing Gina.  
"I'm sorry I disappointed you"

When Gina spoke her voice was raw from the emotion that was stirring up inside herself.  
She didn't accept the Admiral hiding from her, so she turned to face her once again and looked her straight in the eye.  
"Now you listen to me closely Helena Cain. You will never EVER disappoint me, you understand?"  
As she spoke her last word, Gina placed a loving kiss upon her lovers lips.  
A kiss that slowly became a passionate embrace.  
Gina tasted the salt flavor of tears upon her lips, she realized they were not her own.  
Gina wondered if she would ever understand what her lover was going through.  
As they broke the kiss and crawled into a loves embrace Gina whispered.

"It's okay, I've got you ….It's okay….. in the end we're all just human"


End file.
